


wait and wonder

by jbbames (artifice)



Series: put me in the dirt, let me be with the stars [8]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fashion & Models, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Light Angst, M/M, Some Fluff, Some Humor, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-13
Updated: 2019-08-13
Packaged: 2020-08-20 08:54:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20225152
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artifice/pseuds/jbbames
Summary: “It’s great to talk to you too, Bucky—or should I say Barnes? — after only seeing you in tabloids, Fashion TV, and, right,having had radio silence since 2008.I’m doing well, thanks for asking.”Bucky takes a deep breath. “Hi, Jim. It’s been a while. How are you.”





	wait and wonder

**Author's Note:**

> sorry for dropping off the map there. had final exams, then had another exam last saturday for music history that i procrastinated for three years. better late than never??? lol. anyways, i finished the first three quarters of this a few weeks ago, but it was kinda tough to get through/finish and revise (esp after camp nanowrimo burned me tf oouuttt), but whatever!! it's here now in all its shitty glory!!!!! 
> 
> [series playlist here!](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6dD3nFHjQtq0HVoRPxbYFs?si=U-IHMVdEQcKP1q5e6kCWoQ)

** _My body is a house, but my mind is never home._ **

* * *

_April 5, 2010_

Hurting without healing. Pain without like, beauty, or whatever. Bucky wishes he had Steve’s eloquence to express whatever it is he’s feeling now.

Anyway, that’s what’s been floating around in his head as of late. He’s still getting used to the arm, after a year and a half. The pressing silence in his head. Life is just. Life sucks.

Jocelyn quietly canceled their future lessons, all those years ago. He doesn’t— he doesn’t know what to say to her. _Sorry_? Sorry I got hit? Sorry I cut my future short?

Sorry I took one of your favourite students away from you.

God knows, he’s tried to play. He’s tried to get the arm to work, but it’s clunky and heavy and makes him tired. And—and he’s—fucking _tired_. Sick of all the therapy that he can barely pay for, sick of LA, sick of looking at his boyfriend. He’s just— numb. And fucking _cold_, no matter how many layers he puts on, no matter if Steve is cuddling right up against him.

He’s too fucking young for this. That’s what stings the most, still, he thinks. He played in Carnegie hall, for fuck’s sake. He had a tour lined up. He was gonna play his Rachmaninoff in all these cities with all these orchestras and— it hurts to think about, _still_. He needs to get over it. He needs to get over, like. Himself.

The local articles that came out didn’t help in the slightest, either. Promising Pianist’s Dreams Dashed. Other bullshit. Steve didn’t let him touch the paper for a long while after the accident.

Silently, he turns on his right side and burrows deeper under covers. It’s like, 5 AM on a Wednesday, and he can sleep a little more. Not like he has anything better to do than a few sketchy photoshoots with Pierce and Co. later.

Hm. Bad train of thought.

-

“It’s the silence, isn't it?”

Bucky sits in his therapist’s office, staring at everything and nothing all at once. The question jars him back into reality. Patiently, Dr. Sourit— and seriously, what a fucking name, to work with fucked-up brains—repeats the inquiry.

“The silence,” Bucky parrots back dumbly.

Dr. Sourit gives an encouraging nod. “You’re used to spending most of your free time at the piano, or at least being immersed in music.”

“I mean, I’m still pretty immersed in music,” Bucky replies, more out of the need to be antagonistic than anything. All the same, it’s not really a lie. He sees Steve every day, and when Bucky’s not curled up on the bench (staring, as he’s taken to doing, at the keys), Steve’s at his piano, humming and scribbling away at the blank staff paper.

“But not your own.”

And damn, if that isn’t on the fucking dot.

“No,” Bucky says quietly.

Don’t get him wrong—he loves Steve, and he loves what Steve’s doing with his music. And—if Bucky can’t be the one using his beloved grand, then at least Steve’s putting it to good use, right? It’s just that. That. It’s. The reminder maybe, kind of, doesn’t help.

Dr. Sourit eyes him carefully. “Can I suggest something?”

“What’s up, doc.”

“Maybe it’d be good for you to explore other avenues of music. Do a complete one-eighty, so to speak—discover rap, hip hop, the like.”

Bucky frowns. “No offense, but we live in LA. I think I’d have to be real dumb to not know any, like, rap or hip hop music.”

“Of your own?”

What. What does he want? For Bucky to—make his own music?

“I can’t rap,” he says in lieu of an excuse. It’s more like. He doesn’t know. He’s never— tried, and he’s sure he’d, like. Fail miserably if he did.

Dr. Sourit—well, _il sourit_, as the French say. “I think you might be surprised.”

-

So Bucky hits Jim up once he gets back to his apartment (and makes sure Steve isn’t there), because he knows Jim was doing some underground shit with his drums and getting away from his mother’s influence and prestige. Why he’d want to, Bucky doesn’t know. He loves Jocelyn like family. Not that he’s talked to her in a few years. Whoops.

“How do you. Like. Make music,” he blurts out when Jim picks up the phone.

“It’s great to talk to you too, Bucky—or should I say Barnes? — after only seeing you in tabloids, Fashion TV, and, right, having had _radio silence since 2008_. I’m doing well, thanks for asking.”

Bucky takes a deep breath. “Hi, Jim. It’s been a while. How are you.”

“Okay enough. Mom misses you.”

“Give Jocelyn my love.”

“Give it to her yourself, coward.”

Bucky twirls the phone cord around his index finger, anxious.

“Jim,”

“What.” And, okay, to be fair, Jim is completely entitled to acting like a shit.

“Please. I’m trying to make things right for all of us again. And like, make something out of my life.”

Jim is silent for a few (excruciatingly long) moments.

“Come back to New York,” he says, quietly enough that Bucky almost doesn’t hear. “You and Steve. It sucks to see you, all— I don’t know. Devalued to just a body.”

Bucky lets out a humourless, self-deprecating _ha_. “Steve’s got school.”

“Don’t mean you can’t come back.”

Uh. What the fuck. No? No. That’s— separated from Steve? No. _No_.

“Why would you even suggest that.”

Jim’s exasperated sigh crackles in his ear. “Just two weeks, man. Come visit the boys again. You can do a gig or two with the quintet. Learn a bit about digital production. Give yourself a break from being Hydra’s man-whore. Just like. Come home for a bit.”

“I’ll,” Bucky bites his lip and tries not to say anything rash. “I’ll. Think about it.”

“Cool. And, Bucky?” He adds after a moment of heavy silence.

“Yeah.”

“It really is nice to hear from you again, even if you’re being a self-centered asshole, y’know?”

Bucky huffs. “I’ll be in touch.”

“You will,” Jim says, all ominous-like, and promptly hangs up.

-

Before he can talk himself out of it, Bucky’s booked two flights to JFK International to leave on the 7th, and he still doesn’t know how to break the news to Steve. He forwards his flight information to Jim’s email and procrastinates that particular line of thought.

“Buck? I’m home,” Steve calls out.

Bucky wants to yell out in return. He wants to—he wants—

“Bucky?” Steve turns the corner. “Oh. Hey.”

“Hey,” he says, uncharacteristically quiet.

The blond sets his backpack down on the tiny island and starts unpacking his notebooks and textbooks. “Somethin’ happen today?”

The words are right there on his tongue, but somehow, he can’t get them out. Steve pauses in his rummaging and shoots him a questioning look.

“I’m,” he swallows, “We’re going back to New York.” A drop of nervous sweat trickles beneath the collar of his button down. Eyebrows raising higher than they ever have before, Steve slowly turns his whole body to face Bucky and carefully places his hands on the laminate countertop.

Bucky winces. “Not forever, obviously, or— anything. Uhm. It’ll just be. Two weeks.”

“What.” Steve’s voice comes out as a squeak. “Why? Actually, never— just. You didn’t think to discuss this with me?” He adds after a deep breath. Bristling, Bucky crosses his arms and stops leaning against sink.

“You ain’t my ma,” he says, ignoring the petulant tone of his voice.

“No, bless her soul. I am, however, your _boyfriend_. Talk to me.”

Immediately, the tension floods out of Bucky’s shoulders, and he drops his arms, crossing the space between them and taking Steve’s hands in his own— flesh and metal and every insecurity of his exploited by the fashion industry in the blond’s pale, ink-stained grip. What was he thinking? This is Steve. Steve, who’s stuck with him through every shitshow thus far. _Steve_. And they’ve been tip-toeing around each other for God knows how long.

Bucky releases a breath he feels like he’s been holding since two thousand fucking _eight_. “Please,” he whispers, not trusting his voice to remain steady. “Pierce is running me dry. I can’t— I can’t do this anymore. Not to us.”

Steve’s face goes through a series of warring emotions, crumpling as the tears—and they were inevitable, he’s always been a crier— spring to his eyes. He shakes himself free and rounds the island to bury his face in Bucky’s shoulder, in the junction where metal meets skin, and he fling his arms around his waist.

“Took you long enough,” the blond murmurs brokenly against the fabric. “God, I missed— I _missed_ you. You were right here and—and—”

Bucky shushes and pulls him closer. “I’ll be better. I’ll— I’ll make it better for us, baby. We’ll be better.”

He hopes. 

**Author's Note:**

> fuck it i love it hey bucky run up the budget ! *static sounds* u can talk to me on [twitter!](https://twitter.com/artificiaIis)
> 
> n before i forget: thank u @ user irishsaints for being a saint *ba dum tss* and supporting this series so far ur a real one <3


End file.
